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WATERLOO — Fresh from unveiling the Passport smartphone, BlackBerry Ltd. chief executive John Chen on Friday said the company is preparing for more product releases and could unveil an entirely new category of hardware at a mobile trade show in Barcelona next year.

Chen, who said BlackBerry is “maybe a quarter ahead” on its plan to make money from hardware sales, said he is weighing design options and plans to release a fresh device in addition to its upcoming Classic smartphone and upgrades to current handsets including the wide-bodied Passport. Chen said nothing is certain, but wouldn’t rule out a BlackBerry tablet, or even a wearable device.

Speaking to reporters in Waterloo after the company posted a smaller-than-expected loss in its second quarter but missed forecasts on revenue, Chen said BlackBerry will continue to offer products for consumers in the wake of the launch of the enterprise-centric Passport which he said generated 200,000 orders on its first day of sales.

BlackBerry reported a net loss of $207 million (U.S.), or 39 cents a share, in its fiscal second quarter ended Aug. 30, better than its year-earlier loss of $965 million or $1.84 a share.

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Adjusted to exclude items, BlackBerry lost two cents a share in the period versus the consensus estimate of analysts for a loss of 16 cents a share.

Revenue fell 42 per cent to $916 million, well below the $950 million analysts forecast.

Chen, who has been pursuing an ambitious turnaround of the company since taking the helm almost a year ago, said he is focused largely on generating more profits from the company’s mobile security business and other software services.

The CEO also said he expects to double value added software revenue next year and reiterated his promise to return the company to positive cash flow by the end of this fiscal year in February 2015.

BlackBerry reported a negative “normalized” cash flow in the quarter of just $36 million, improved from negative $255 million in the previous quarter, while its cash and equivalents stood at $3.1-billion at the end of the quarter, barely changed from the previous quarter.

Chen said he is hoping for a bottoming of revenue declines in coming quarters on the heels of the launch of the Passport unveiled Wednesday and this fall’s debut of the physical-keyboard Classic, a reboot of the popular BlackBerry Bold.

Chen said the Passport device surpassed his expectations and he has high hopes for the Classic.

He added that the immediate goal is to stem losses and generate cash flow but “over time I definitely would like to reach the everyday people, but it’s too early for us now. One thing at a time — let’s get ourselves making money.”

BlackBerry had written down nearly $1 billion on unsold smartphones aimed at consumers but Chen said he is working on concept devices for the market, with one to debut at the Mobile World Congress in March.

And Chen said he is already planning an update of the Passport, with its wide screen and the hybrid touch and QWERTY keyboard after it was introduced at events in Toronto, London and Dubai on Wednesday. Chen said it sold out on BlackBerry’s website and Amazon.com within 10 hours.

“Undersupply is a better problem than oversupply.” Chen added that BlackBerry’s plan to double software revenue next year from $250 million is based on the strength of new features, calling it a challenging but achievable goal.

Over the past year, BlackBerry has been squeezed from all angles by Chen, who stepped into the leadership role with the goal of creating a leaner and profitable operation.

So far, he has made significant progress and has stuck to a goal of making the company breakeven on cash flow by February 2015, which is the end of the company’s fiscal year.

But he also has to contend with a longtime BlackBerry customer base in the corporate world that has migrated over to competitors like Apple’s iPhone and the Samsung Galaxy models.

Fewer users has meant lower services revenue for offerings like access to its secure enterprise servers.

During the quarter, services revenue fell 18 per cent to $424 million from the previous quarter, though BlackBerry is hoping that a change in how it charges for its offerings will help bolster those results in the future.

On a regional basis, revenue declined in every key market for the company with the exception of North America, where sales of older BlackBerry devices helped buoy the results compared with the first quarter, the company said.

Across the world, BlackBerry booked revenue on 2.1 million smartphone sales in the period, which is an improvement over the previous quarter when it was 1.6 million devices.

The company also boosted the cash in its coffers by $11 million to $3.1 billion.

BlackBerry is also pushing a variety of subscription-based security services. A more secure version of its BlackBerry Messenger service is already being sold to corporate customers. Additional features like money transfer and a virtual conference service called BBM Meetings will be incorporated for an additional cost.

“We have a pretty strong plan in attacking the enterprise space for monetizing these features,” Chen said.

Monetizing BBM has been a goal of BlackBerry for over a year, though it hasn’t disclosed any revenue figures yet. Active users on the platform grew to 91 million in the quarter from 85 million, the company reported.

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